


Debriefing

by OldShrewsburyian



Series: Time's a strange fellow [4]
Category: Timeless (TV 2016)
Genre: (for 'light angst' read: everyone is sort of traumatized by what happened in San Francisco), American History, Black Character(s), Canon Lesbian Relationship, Comfort Food, Everyone Is Alive, Everyone Needs A Hug, Friendship/Love, Human Disaster Garcia Flynn, Lesbian Character of Color, Light Angst, Married Couple, Multi, Nerdiness, No One Deserves Rufus, POV Multiple, POV Wyatt Logan, Poor Lucy, Post-Finale, Post-Season/Series 02, Post-War, Some Humor, Team Dynamics, Team Feels, Time Travel, Wine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-05-29 09:33:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15070298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OldShrewsburyian/pseuds/OldShrewsburyian
Summary: I have recklessly, gleefully substituted my own, Le Carré-inflected idea of how debriefings go than anything more closely resembling reality, in order to present these scenes of the Time Team's postwar debriefing.I. DeniseII. Rufus/JiyaIII. WyattIV. LucyV. FlynnVI. Epilogue





	1. Denise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter I: in which there is domestic fluff.

“Have I told you,” says Denise, taking the glass of Merlot from Michelle’s hand, “that you are a wonderful woman and I love you?”

“This morning,” says Michelle dryly, dimpling. “But that was a very long time ago.”

“Mm.” Denise leans in to kiss her wife. “Far too long ago.” She sits down at the kitchen island. “I promise I will be capable of human speech once I’m about halfway through this.”

“No rush.” Michelle stirs the pot on the stove methodically. 

“Is that what I think it is?”

“If you think it’s chana masala…”

“I definitely don’t deserve you.”

“Hey,” says Michelle, “you manage to keep on top of homework schedules and the dishes while saving the world. Pretty impressive.”

Denise groans and slumps over the counter. “Doing the dishes is relaxing. And I am so ready to be done with this assignment.”

“You’ll miss the people, though. Pour me a top-up too, while you’re at it.”

“I will,” agrees Denise. “How would you feel about having them over?” 

“The new Denise Christopher!” Michelle pantomimes shock. “Inviting work colleagues over!”

“Well.” Denise offers an ironic salute with her wine glass. “Surely it’s hardly the same if we’ve finished the top-secret projects and are back to being semi-normal.”

Michelle puts a lid on the pot, turns on the rice cooker. “Fair. And I liked Lucy.”

“She’s a sweet kid. Listen to me — a woman in her thirties, a sweet kid. I must be getting old.”

“Never,” says Michelle loyally. 

“Would you believe I got parenting advice from a terrorist? Well, ex-terrorist. Alleged terrorist. Assassin. Spy.”

“You want to slow down on the Merlot?”

“It was good advice!” protests Denise.

“Right.”

“We should have him to dinner,” says Denise musingly. “I don’t think he has anyone. I _know_ he doesn’t have anyone.”

“You don’t pay me enough not to tell the FBI what a softie you are.”

“True. They’re a good group, though, they really are. Most teams in those conditions wouldn’t have gotten through the past two years without at least one deadly rivalry. Even the sexual hookups seem to have sorted themselves out on this one.”

“Denise! The kids will hear you.”

“Sorry.”

“Friday’s math test is in the green folder, if you want to look at it.”

“Do I dare?”

“B+.”

“Oh, that’s great!” Denise flips through the marked-up pages. “See, he can work…”

Michelle laughs. “Under duress. I promised them we could have a movie tonight when you got back.”

“Fine. Can I fall asleep on your shoulder?”

“I’d be disappointed if you didn’t.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Rufus and Jiya answer questions about their future.

“Mr. …Carlin.” The agent draws out the syllables with something like skepticism.

“If that’s my CV you’re looking at,” says Rufus, “it’s all absolutely genuine. Summa cum laude, etcetera. I haven’t updated it with the time travel yet. How do you even enter that on a CV line? 1762-present? I feel like piloting a time machine is a pretty kickass skill, though; marketable.”

“Mr. Carlin,” says the agent sharply. “You have been thoroughly apprised of the security agreements covering all aspects of your work on this project.”

“Oh, absolutely. I’ll put it under something innocuous like ‘developed and piloted — ha! — new transport models.’ Team-building exercises could go on there too. I’ll stop any time you feel like having a real conversation instead of implying I’m not qualified to do the stuff I obviously did. Already. In the occasionally-distant past of which we will not speak, apparently.”

The silence that descends gets heavier by the second. “Okay,” says Rufus, “look, can we just get this over with? I don’t know how many Sunday dinners it’ll take for my mom to start trusting that things are back to normal. But it’ll be a lot.”

“We’re confident of your bona fides, Mr. Carlin,” says Agent #2 (Good Cop.) “We’d just like to discuss some of the particulars of the work you’ve done.”

Rufus takes a deep breath. “I presume you don’t mean the actual particulars of what I do. I mean,” he adds hastily, “equations, differentials…” He clears his throat. “What do you want to know?” 

“Tell us,” says Agent #1, relaxing the Bad Cop act slightly, “how you see this work fitting into the rest of your career. Tell us about the dynamics of the mission.”

“Tell us what you’d like to do next,” suggests Good Cop.

“Easy part first: I have, literally, figured out things about time and space that no one else knows. And I’ve watched enough _Doctor Who_ that I’m not at risk of getting, like, drunk on power. So my plan is to, I don’t know, invent flying cars or something; that would be cool. Now that we’ve got time travel down, renewable energy ought to be no trouble. Okay.” Rufus swallows. “You’ll have the details on how… complicated things were in the beginning.” Even now, a knot forms in his stomach. Strange, to think how much easier things were once he was literally living underground instead of being extremely well-paid to wear a microphone on the team’s missions. 

“Technically,” he says, “I suppose none of us is completely clean. Except Lucy and Jiya — and Agent Christopher, of course.” Rufus stares at his interlaced fingers. “But we were a team,” he says; “we are a team.” He looks up, gathers their attention. “It’s important that you know that.”

“Duly noted, Mr. Carlin,” says Agent #1. 

“I mean,” says Rufus, “it worked shockingly well, really. Plenty of near-death experiences, but… if you’d told me that I’d trust a white guy from Texas to have my back, I would _not_ have believed you. But here we are. Lucy’s great: kept us from dying, kept the other guys from killing each other.”

“No civilian-military tensions?”

Rufus shrugs. “More Voice of Reason versus… not that. Or Star Wars versus Star Trek. Or what we should do on missions. Or whose turn it was to do the dishes.” _Or who was the best dancer, or what kind of food we missed most, or which movie we should watch next…_ “If you want to know whether your acronyms were fighting each other: no.”

“As for what I’d like to do next… I would like,” says Rufus, “to live a long life, with average levels of fear. It’s a big ask, I know.”

***

Jiya exhales, staring out the window at three dusty palm trees. How _would_ she describe traveling through time, developing technology, saving the world? “It’s been… challenging. Exhilarating. Seriously trippy.”

“Seriously trippy,” repeats the middle-aged man whose badge identifies him as Agent Hernandez. “We usually try, Ms. Marri, for slightly more precision.”

“Okay. Surreal? Mind-blowing? Reality-bending? Any of those would fit.”

“We’d like to know more about your experience of the mission.”

Jiya restrains herself from asking a flippant question: _What, are you putting together a brochure?_ “As I said,” says Jiya slowly, “it was challenging. But the team has been great. Agent Christopher’s a good boss.” _And she made us ugly scarves for Bunker Christmas; Rufus repaired a Polaroid camera so we could take a picture for her._ “Connor — Mr. Mason — was really generous.” _It turns out he’s a nerd and a sweetheart; who knew?_ But these people don’t want to hear about the ways in which an FBI agent and a rogue billionaire have semi-adopted her… do they? 

Agent Hernandez is nodding, making a few notes on a legal pad. “And the rest of the team?”

Jiya shifts in her chair. Maybe honesty _is_ the best policy? “I love them,” she says simply. “They — we’re like family to each other. Even Flynn: everyone needs a grumpy uncle, right?” _When he figured out that I’d learned to polka in San Francisco, he wouldn’t rest until I did it with him. He sang, and Lucy clapped the rhythm, and we danced ourselves breathless, and I laughed when I thought I’d never laugh again. He pulled three stitches; Denise pretended to be furious._

“Mm.” Hernandez scribbles again. Jiya could swear that the blonde agent is playing a game on her phone under the table; maybe she’s a trainee, or maybe she’s there to throw people off.

“You are aware,” says Hernandez, without looking up, “that Mr. Flynn faces terrorism charges?”

“I am _aware_ ,” says Jiya acerbically, “that he’s probably saved all of our lives. And I’m pretty sure your notes will say that those charges were manufactured. Try flipping back a couple of pages.”

“We would of course be concerned,” says Agent Hernandez — still without looking up, without so much as blinking — “if a scientist of your talents were indiscriminate in deciding for whom, and with whom, to work.”

 _Hey,_ thinks Jiya, _that’s not so bad. Not ‘young woman,’ but ‘scientist.’ Nice._ “Like I said,” she says aloud, “Connor has been very good to me. I wasn’t expecting the whole underground bunker, time travel thing. I’d be quite happy just working on product development.” As she says it, she suddenly wonders if it’s true. But she’ll have time to worry about that, she promises herself; she’ll have time.

“What are your goals?” asks Blondie suddenly.

“My goals?” echoes Jiya. “Win a Nobel Prize, marry my boyfriend, meet Patrick Stewart, and adopt a dog. Not necessarily in that order.” Hernandez’ ballpoint slips, and he stifles a sudden cough. _Newsflash: he might be human after all._ “So,” says Jiya brightly, “anything else?”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Wyatt Logan clarifies his priorities

He tells himself that the most dangerous thing he could do is to assume that he knows the drill. He reminds himself firmly, arming himself against the familiarity of the room, the one-way mirror, the table with its rickety leg, that this will be different than anything that has gone before. They never know, of course, what kind of war you’ve been fighting. But the fact that they know that, this time — that they have at least some sense of how utterly alien his experience is to them — will unsettle him, will make them dangerous. And come to think of it, reflects Wyatt wryly, he has no idea what reentry policies are when you’ve been in a different century or three, rather than on a different continent. He remembers something Mason quoted to them all, one night after just enough whiskey: _The past is another country; they do things differently there._ The door opens.

Sergeant Wyatt Logan gets to his feet. Agent Courtenay is a pale, watery man who looks as though he’s spent too many hours in rooms just like this one. Agent Sharp, a pace or two behind him, is still vibrant, still vital, and rigorous from the shine on her shoes to the neat rows of braids on her head. 

“Sir,” says Wyatt; “Ma’am.”

“Take a seat, Sergeant.” It is Courtenay who speaks. The silence after they do so is one of tacit mutual assessment: so, we know where we stand. Courtenay glances methodically through his papers, as though he’s just now getting around to them. Sharp keeps her folder closed, her hands neatly folded on top of it. “Looks like you have quite a mission behind you.”

“Understatement,” says Wyatt crisply. _Laugh line. Ha very ha._ But it feels dangerous to give way to levity here. 

“But you got your whole team out,” says Agent Sharp. Her warmth seems genuine.

“Yeah.” He exhales, relief hitting him as fresh as surprise; he is determined that these people will never know how close that was to not being true, or how much they all risked to make it so. “We did.”

“You say we,” says Agent Courtenay. Is that how they’re going for him? Getting him to play hero, play him off against the rest of the team? He reflects uncomfortably that it might have worked once.

“I do,” says Wyatt firmly. “Team effort, absolutely. There were a lot of ways this could have gone FUBAR. They picked our roles for a reason. We wouldn’t have lasted 10 minutes on the ground without our historian — believe me, I have opinions about dropping an untrained civilian into this kind of thing cold, especially one who weighs 130 soaking wet, but she was essential. We sure as hell needed our pilots. Both of them.” He wonders suddenly if that’s too much to say, if it’s risky to let Courtenay and Sharp wonder about exactly why both pilots were indispensable. “And,” continues Wyatt, swallowing his reluctance, “we needed two soldiers.” He tries not to think too hard about the longest half hour of his life, feeling Rufus go cold, holding onto Jiya, wondering what on earth he would do if Jessica showed up again, or if Lucy didn’t.

“You had no qualms about that?” asks Agent Sharp.

He laughs. “Oh, I had qualms. _Qualms_ is a mild way of putting it.”

“But you needed two soldiers,” says Courtenay dryly.

“Yes, sir.”

“And the team worked,” prompts Sharp.

“Yes, ma’am.” If this is all they want assurance of, this may be easier than he had dared to hope. 

“Look,” says Wyatt, “I don’t know how you calculate time spent on active duty when time travel is involved, but shouting at recruits on a shooting range is sounding really good right about now. And it doesn’t have to be a shooting range. But if it’s all right with you, I’d like to spend a while in the same timezone — ” _hell, in the same time period_ — “show the new guys the ropes, maybe make their path a little easier. I have a lot of experience,” he says. “And I’m good at my job.”

What he does not say is: _my team consisted of a civilian woman, a genius immigrant just out of college, a Black guy, and a dude from one of those countries you still think of as Soviet — and no one died! Hire me to help run diversity training; my lesbian boss will write me a reference._

“I’m sorry, Sergeant,” says Courtenay gravely — and that is his first warning, the first thing that makes the hair on his neck stand up — “but there’s no way we can clear you for residence on an Army base.”

There does not seem to be sufficient air in the room. “Can I ask why?”

The agents exchange a look calculated to communicate pity for his stupidity, and perhaps just a trace of suspicion: is it possible for ignorance that deep to be unfeigned?

Sharp leans forward, putting her elbows on the desk. “Your wife, Sergeant,” she says.

It is like getting a one-two punch from the guy who forgot to mention he boxed in college: the loss of breath, the dizzying crack across everything you thought you knew. Everything seems to slow down, the rhythm of the interview broken. Suddenly, Wyatt has all the time in the world to think. Jessica: the best thing that ever happened to him, the worst betrayal he’s known, and now this. A Spanish proverb — handed across a grimy counter with an illegal bottle of booze, too many miles and years ago — comes into his mind unbidden: _take what you want and pay for it, says God._ He sees a man in a windbreaker, bleeding out in a parking lot. He sees her beautiful and unrepentant in San Francisco, knows again the sick terror he felt before realizing that the man next to him was aiming, with cool and perfect accuracy, at her gun hand. He remembers her laughing and drunk on cheap beer, waiting for him in too many airports, promising before every mission that she wouldn’t cry, breaking the promise every time. He remembers her sobbing against his chest, the night they got her back. At first, he had thought that she was telling him she loved him, using the words like a child apologizing for a risk that had spiraled into disaster; then he realized that what she was saying, over and over between her sobs, was _I trust you, I trust you, I trust you._ He knows, with absolute and devastating clarity, that she is worth more than everything he has given for her. Wyatt Logan takes a deep breath.

“I hope,” he says, allowing his drawl to spin along the edge of insolence, “you aren’t suggesting that I should divorce my wife. The Army’s stats on that are bad enough.”

“We’re just clarifying,” says Courtenay, hard and dry as red earth in summer, “the parameters of any future assignments you might be given.”

Wyatt inhales again, lets the breath spool slowly through his lungs, spares a thought for all the times in mess hall he mocked the ‘centering exercises’ they’d been given as part of training. “But you’d allow me to work a desk if we lived off base.”

Another of those assessing, disconcerting glances. “The issue,” says Agent Sharp, “is your wife’s access to sensitive information.”

Wyatt raises an eyebrow. “I was in Delta Force. There is a lot — a hell of a lot, to keep it polite — that Jessica does not know.”

“She wouldn’t be allowed on base,” says Courtenay. “Not ever, not for any reason.”

“Right,” says Wyatt, “so we’ll miss the Christmas party. I can live with that. I just…” He pauses. Restarts, matter-of-fact instead of pleading: “I want to stay in the Army. It probably says something about my life that it sounds comparatively peaceful, at this point. But like I said, I think I could do good work there.” _And I think you know it._ “I want to stay in the Army,” Wyatt repeats. “And I need Jessica in my life. ”

There is a small silence, and then Agent Sharp squares her papers. “You’re a very loyal man, Sergeant Logan.”

The rush in his veins feels like freedom. “Yes, ma’am,” says Wyatt happily.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Lucy Preston takes a stand, and makes a confession.

“Dr. Preston.”

Lucy nods, takes her seat as smoothly as if she were settling in for an academic Q&A. The analogy may not be too far-fetched. The pitfalls are never where one expects them to be. She can’t help but feel, though, that the correct use of her title is a good sign. 

“You must realize,” says the other woman, her consonants soft, “that yours is an unusual position.”

The understatement is risible; but Lucy is not tempted to laugh. “I do realize it.”

“Are you planning to maintain your security clearances?”

The question is asked as if it is neutral, and she knows it is anything but. She bites back a semi-panicked response: _I don’t want to maintain my damn security clearances, I just want to get out, out of your crosshairs, out of your paperwork._

“You have acquired information that may be sensitive,” says the first agent, as repressively as if Lucy had been guilty of an outburst. “We need to know about how you plan on handling that.”

 _Information that may be sensitive._ Lucy wonders if it’s normal to feel this amount of frustration with bureaucrats who don’t seem to be capable of imagining the kind of work she’s been doing, ostensibly on their behalf. She’ll have to ask Wyatt. “I don’t plan on telling my survey classes that I spied for George Washington, if that’s what you mean.”

The two women on the other side of the desk exchange glances; she can’t help but think that the rearranging of the folders in front of them is strategic, a way of texturing the silence. 

“You’ve been through a great deal, Dr. Preston,” says the first agent, without a trace of sympathy in her voice. Her name, according to her badge, is Smith; Lucy supposes that someone’s has to be. “For you more than the others, these missions have meant a direct interference with your previous line of work.”

A hysterical bubble of laughter rises in Lucy’s throat. _You could say that_. “Yeah,” she says, matching Agent Smith’s flat tone. “They have. Do you guys pay for therapy?”

“We do.” It is the second agent who speaks, in her sweetly Spanish-inflected voice. “A certain number of sessions. You’ll be given the necessary papers.”

“Great.” Lucy sighs. She’s tempted to run a hand through her hair, glad she has it gathered back, sleek and untouchable. “I don’t know what you want me to say. That I’ll be sure my students learn that John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln? That I won’t write a tell-all memoir? That I won’t — I don’t know — fall to pieces? Believe me, if I were going to do that, it would have happened a long time ago.” She pushes away the memory of a San Francisco alleyway.

“Would you be willing to do it again?” Lucy’s jaw drops. Agent Smith’s voice is still steely, giving nothing away.

“Would I — what? Is this some sort of hypothetical question? If you’re asking if I’d be willing to custom-engineer American history — world history — on your say-so, the answer is absolutely not.” She is so incandescently angry at the idea that she doesn’t care how many bridges her rage burns. “If you’re asking if I think it was worth it…” Losing the people she loved and finding others; saving people who were irreplaceable, and people who were ordinary; a Hollywood party, a Nazi stronghold, and the not-yet-electrified lights of Chicago and New York; the dignity of the enslaved, the courage of the unconventional, and all the terrifying beauty of the past… “Yes,” says Lucy, because she does not know how she could say anything else. “Yes.”

“We were asking,” says the second agent, still mildly, “if you would be willing to undertake similar missions in the future, should the need arise.”

“Historical causality doesn’t work that way,” says Lucy. She is too tired for patience. She would do almost anything for a cup of tea, or for a vodka and tonic. “I can’t — I can’t promise to prevent nuclear war by going back to Yalta, or Dunkirk, or Tsushima. I don’t know what the alternative to the Korematsu decision would look like. If we lost the Revolutionary War, would the abolitionists still have gotten the votes they needed in Parliament, and ended slavery here sooner? Or would more wealthy landowners have decided that they couldn’t vote against the best interests of the constituency that elected them? Whatever the result, we could still have gotten some version of the Jim Crow era; it doesn’t mean we could get restitution agreements — ” Agent Smith’s eyes are starting to glaze over; Lucy stops. 

“I’ll handle all the sensitive information you want,” she says. Almost despite herself, she can’t help seeing the humor in the request. “I’m a historian; I do that all the time. I’ll let my security clearances lapse and… and go back to working against my tenure clock.” A clock that only runs in one direction! She stifles, again, the wild desire to laugh.

“We were just trying…” begins Lucy, and stops. “This whole damn thing was about damage control,” she says flatly. “We were working to prevent Rittenhouse from tailoring history to suit their needs. And to stay alive,” she adds softly. “To keep each other alive.”

Again that purposeful-purposeless shuffling of papers, taking their time, taking wordless consultation with each other. “You did not have reason to doubt the commitment of the others on your team?” There’s a bit of an upward twist in the end of that question; even Agent Smith can’t keep her voice quite even.

Lucy tells herself bitterly that she should have seen that one coming. “The one time we had another soldier stand in for Wyatt — Sergeant Logan — it was a disaster. He was rash and unimaginative and we lost him. Being willing to work together, to adapt together, is what let us survive.” She doesn’t think they’ve picked up on the fact that she’s stalling, but they can hardly fail to notice if she continues to talk for too long without answering the question. 

“We had to trust each other,” says Lucy slowly. “I… I asked Flynn the question, once. He never gave me reason to doubt his answer. Wyatt has always been dedicated to the mission.” How many evasions, she wonders, lie under that single truth, and how many can they hear in her voice? “Rufus and Jiya nearly lost _everything_.” _We all have_ , she thinks. _We have all come so unbearably close to losing everything. Maybe some of us have lost things we don’t even miss yet; maybe the shock is still coming, maybe this is the moment after the blow, before you feel the pain._

“Look,” says Lucy, “do you want to ask me questions? Ask me questions.” This is a dangerous offer to make. She knows it before the words have left her mouth, but she is too exhausted to care. “I’m not going to sit here trying to convince you of something you don’t want to believe when the evidence is sitting in front of you.” It’s a guess — she doesn’t _know_ what’s in the folders — but it hits home, to judge by the flicker on the second agent’s face.

“And you are confident,” says the second agent, her tone almost reassuring, “that this can be smoothly wound up.”

Lucy resists the temptation to pinch the bridge of her nose. “No,” she says. “No, I’m not. But I’m as sure as I can be.” She puts her shoulders back, waits to gather their attention. The trick that has worked on half-attentive students works here too. “I’m a historian,” she says. “Any good historian will tell you that a simple ending is a lie. But we have done our jobs — jobs that we had to invent, that we had to learn as we went along — to the best of our ability. And I am as sure as I can be that we have left things… ready for the future.” It feels unexpectedly weighty to say it, to acknowledge aloud that that is precisely what they have been trying to do all along. 

Agent Smith makes a note on the file in front of her. “And what does that mean for you, personally?” 

Lucy is quite sure that twisting her hands in her lap is some sort of tell, some sort of mark against her. She stills them; they still grip each other too tightly. “I lost my sister,” she says. “I lost my mother. I just want to go home,” says Lucy. “I want to go home, even though I don’t know what that means anymore.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Garcia Flynn makes ill-advised wisecracks.

Mentally he dubs them Pig-Eyes and Death’s-Head. They are like a caricature of themselves, too absurd to be intimidating. In any case, Flynn flatters himself that they would know that intimidating him would be a lost cause. Could they have been selected solely to annoy him? Possibly. Probably, in fact.

It is Death’s-Head who speaks first. “Your career has been an unconventional one, it would seem.” _Career. Unconventional._ As if they were interviewing him for a job, rather than to see which off-the-grid prison would be best to hold him. “You appear as an intelligence asset in 1993 — ” Death’s-Head pretends to check a reference — “yes, 1993; positions, weapons, exactly the sort of information a battalion fighting informal organizations in unfamiliar territory would want, offered on a silver platter by a single agent who slipped past the perimeter. Too good to be true, I thought, until I noticed that they’d interviewed you in hospital.”

He stays relaxed, motionless. He knows this game, and he’s not playing it.

“Remarkable versatility,” continues Death’s-Head, almost dreamily. “Half a dozen campaigns, as many languages… an occasional tendency to go off-script, perhaps…”

“Are my eyes really brown?” asks Flynn mildly of the ceiling.

“What?” demands Pig-Eyes sharply.

“Nothing,” says Flynn, sweetly and mendaciously. _Of course the man hasn’t seen Casablanca._

“You have an impressive record, Mr. Flynn,” says Death’s-Head. The attempt to retake control is obvious.

“Thank you. If I’d known you were asking me here to receive a commendation, I would’ve prepared a speech.”

The atmosphere becomes more brittle, more dangerous. “Iraq was a long time ago,” says Death’s-Head. “We are more interested in your recent activities.” Flynn waits. “You seem to have outgrown your squeamishness about collateral damage.” The massacre of two innocents, and a child’s bedding splattered with blood… he knows exactly where he became indifferent to collateral damage, and why. He suspects they do too. The question of where and why that changed again — the deadly weight of a grenade in his hand, his target’s ragged breathing and his own, a woman’s face in the glow of the Hindenburg — is more complicated. The less of that they know or guess, he decides, the better.

“There is a vital difference,” says Pig-Eyes primly, “between ruthlessness and recklessness, Mr. Flynn. The former can be a necessary asset, while the latter…”

“If you’re going to give me a lecture,” says Flynn, his voice colder and sharper than he means it to be, “you can skip it. If you’re going to give me hypothetical situations, you might as well get started.”

“We are not in the business of creating hypothetical exercises,” says Death’s-Head, “nor that of making empty threats.” _Good: now they’re getting somewhere._

“So tell me what you are doing.”

“We are assessing,” says Death’s-Head repressively, “your role in the Lifeboat missions.” _So that’s what they’re calling them now._ “The reports are… conflicting.”

A line from one of Lucy’s bunker novels teases at his memory: _I hear such different accounts of you as puzzle me exceedingly._ “Indeed?” says Flynn.

“Stealing nuclear weapons?” Death’s-Head is urbane, incredulous.

“Part of a nuclear weapon,” corrects Flynn.

“Getting one of the operatives shot?”

“That was before I joined the mission.”

“Mm.” Pig-Eyes is audibly unimpressed.

“You are also on record as disabling three Rittenhouse operatives. While alone.” Death’s-Head frowns over his file, as if disapproving the sloppy handling of a mission that left Flynn unsupervised, whatever the outcome.

“That’s right. Well,” Flynn adds, “to be precise, I killed them.” Death’s-Head looks up. “You said ‘disabled,’ ” explains Flynn helpfully. “I killed them. Just so we’re clear.”

“Perfectly.”

“If you want a list of all the Rittenhouse agents I took out,” says Flynn, “we’ll be here a while.” He lets his eyes go wide, all naive inquiry. “Is that not in your records?”

Pig-Eyes reaches a conclusion. “It would appear that you are a valuable asset, Mr. Flynn.”

“I presumed,” says Flynn dryly, “that was the reason we’ve been having this conversation.”

“There are any number of places you could be useful,” says Death’s-Head.

“Oh, I know.”

“The question is,” continues Death’s-Head, “whether or not the risk is worth it.” His voice is as cold as the metal of a gun barrel.

Flynn moistens his lips. “You wouldn’t even have to send me anywhere. Hook me up to whatever you’re intercepting and have me translate.” He hopes it doesn’t sound like a plea. “You should be grateful,” he says, affecting injured generosity. “I’m volunteering to listen to Russians brag about their dicks.”

Would it be better, Flynn wonders, if he showed himself to them desperate? Would it be better if he bared his teeth like a wolf? howled like a dog? flipped the table into their faces? Would it be better if he showed himself to them empty, exhausted, asking only for a quiet corner in which to lick his wounds? If he told these avid officials that a God he sometimes tries not to believe in has shown him grace, and that it is not to them that he looks for absolution — would it be a lie, or an act of hubris?

“The alternative,” says Pig-Eyes, his voice going shrill and tight, “is prison. And this time,” he continues, with a vicious smugness that Flynn doesn’t think is feigned, “no one will go looking for you.”

He feels the tightening along his jaw, the slight twitch that he prevents from becoming something clenched and desperate. He doesn’t think he gives them any other tell. He’s not even sure the shot was intended to register as more than a needling reminder of the fact that he’s dispensable to them. He is glad that his hands are under the table, their incipient tremor concealed. Because he is suddenly afraid, with a fear that feels like certainty, that Pig-Eyes is wrong. She wouldn’t know how to go about it, of course; but that wouldn’t be enough to stop her, if… if…. Best to leave that line of thought unexplored. Flynn schools his breathing. Wyatt would understand: this knowledge braces him. Wyatt is a soldier, and he would understand, and he might be able to convince her to keep her head down, build her life.

Aloud he says: “That’s a cheap line.” To Death’s-Head: “You should give him better lines; he can’t pull off menace.” 

“You are willing, I take it,” says Death’s-Head, as smoothly as though he had never been interrupted, “to undertake whatever we might ask of you. In good faith.”

Flynn spreads his hands, rests them on the edge of the table. “Fine. Put me somewhere in the mountains or the desert, alongside some angry teenagers, middle-aged drunks, and — God help us — true believers in their cause. Wait for the average life expectancy on such jobs to catch up with me.” Flynn stretches, smiles. “I even have the right scars: American bullets, American prison. But I will remind you,” says Garcia Flynn evenly, “that a man with nothing to live for is a dangerous tool to use.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It is a truth universally acknowledged that Garcia Flynn will not stop sassing people even when his personal safety is at stake.
> 
> It is my headcanon that each member of the Time Team gets two novels to while away the time between missions, and that Lucy's are _Pride and Prejudice_ and _Jane Eyre._


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there is an ending, and a beginning.

They are released almost simultaneously, finding each other at the security checkpoint — a clumsy fumbling at arms and shoulders for reassurance, not daring to embrace under the eyes of the guards — and finding their belongings on the other side. It is a sight of curious finality: the only personal possessions they’ve had for the last two years, gathered into transparent bags in anonymous plastic trays.

“Height of fashion,” mutters Jessica, picking up hers, and the other four attempt smiles.

“Connor texted,” says Rufus. “He says he’s buying the first three rounds.”

“I’m sending Denise a champagne emoji,” says Jiya. “Just so she knows we’re okay.”

Wyatt laughs. “Okay. I… am definitely way too intimidated by her to do that.” Jiya makes a face at him. “I don’t suppose there’s any way of knowing where Flynn’s gotten to?” No one answers the question; they ignore it as studiously as an ill omen.

“He’ll catch up with us,” says Rufus eventually, meeting no one’s eyes.

“He’d better,” says Jiya. She pulls her phone back out of her pocket. “I’m telling him that I’m never speaking to him again if he doesn’t.”

“If you also text Flynn solely using emojis,” says Rufus, “don’t tell me. I don’t think my brain could process that right now.”

“Taxi’s on its way,” says Jessica. “I need to sit down in a chair that isn’t an instrument of torture.”

There is a general sympathetic murmur, and the five of them lapse into a dazed silence. The late afternoon sun is hot on the asphalt, and the haze over the city is thick. 

“Luce?” ventures Wyatt, after an interval. “You okay?”

She nods, straightens. “Just tired.” She pulls down her hair, shakes it loose around her shoulders as if to prove a point.

“Connor’s taste in bars is excellent,” says Rufus reassuringly; they are silent once more until the taxi comes.

“Oh,” says Jessica, as the car pulls up. “You’d think I’d know my way around their app, sending drunks home… maybe they sent us a sedan by mistake?”

“It’s fine,” says Lucy quickly. “You all go. I’ll — I’ll hang around for a few minutes.”

“Thanks, Luce.” Wyatt already has his hand at the small of Jessica’s back, shepherding her.

Jiya grabs both of Lucy’s hands in hers. “Don’t use this as an excuse not to come.”

“Not a chance, Cagney.”

“Okay.” Rufus envelops her in a swift hug. “We’ll see you soon.” He raises his eyebrows, and she hears the unspoken _both of you_ , somewhere between a question and a promise. She nods, manages a smile, and waves them out of the parking lot. Then she tucks herself neatly out of the range of the nearest CCTV camera, braces her back against the wall of the center, and waits.

Every car on the highway seems to taunt her by having a purpose, a direction. She tells herself she should summon a taxi, or at least text Jiya. She does neither of these things; she tells herself it is superstitious to feel as though doing so would feel like jinxing any hope she has. Lucy waits. She wonders about going back inside for a glass of water, a chance to observe. _Oh, I just happened to be loitering in your parking lot, avoiding your security cameras._ She wonders about going in and demanding to see him. _I know what he’s done — he’s saved my life — I don’t care — you can’t just —_ But of course (and this is the knowledge that settles in her gut like lead), they can. 

Lucy waits long enough that she begins to entertain insane visions of sitting down on the concrete and sobbing like a lost child, in the atavistic faith that someone would have to do something about it. And then he emerges. 

He does not see her at first. A stranger, she thinks, might still describe his gait as prowling; to her it looks as though he is testing the earth lest it give way beneath his feet. He stands in the middle of the parking lot, his shadow grotesquely long, like Picasso’s idea of a pointing finger. He runs a hand through his hair, lets it linger briefly at the back of his neck. She allows herself to wonder what he would do if she ran up to him, flung herself into his arms. Lucy clears her throat.

“Flynn.” It emerges as a small sound, tentative, and she hates it. He does not whirl to face her. He goes completely still — attention in the line of his spine, in the way he balances his weight — and then he turns slowly, by half steps, as if afraid of being deceived by hope. She imagines that it must be written on her face: her relief, her longing. But even once their eyes have met, he keeps his expression a studied blank, and a jolt of fear goes through her. _What have they done? What have they demanded?_

She tries again: “Flynn?” There’s a crack in it this time, but at least it’s more audible. He takes a step towards her, and stops. She wonders if he’s afraid of presuming too much; she wonders if he’s afraid of his knees giving way. Lucy takes a deep breath. The habit of self-denial, deep as instinct, clamors against what she is about to do. But she is tired of loss, and she is tired of sacrifice, and she is half-sick with the knowledge of how easy it would be to tell him simply that the others are waiting, and that they can share a taxi. Lucy sets down the holdall of too-worn clothes and too-worn paperbacks. She forces herself to cross the space between them — asphalt hot under her feet, her eyes locked on his. She reaches up, knots her fist in his shirtfront. She hears his breath stutter like a stalled engine.

“Are you all right?”

He half-laughs at that. “Yes,” he says softly. “Yes, Lucy, I’m all right.”

“Good.” There are other questions she could have asked — other questions she still might ask, and perhaps should. But Lucy Preston, _magister artis, doctor philosophiae_ , leaves all her possible avenues of inquiry unexplored. All save one. She twists her grip tighter on the fabric of his shirt (a protesting whine of thread, a caught breath in his throat), raises herself on tiptoe, and parts her lips in invitation.

The next instant, he is kissing her with a need as great as her own. She keens — an involuntary, necessary plea — and his arms go around her to lift her, bring her closer. One of her shoes falls to the ground. When a car horn honks, she clings to him, does not open her eyes or break away until the irritably revved engine and squealing tires have receded into silence. Only reluctantly does she draw back. He gazes at her in what she can only classify as mingled awe and disbelief. He half-murmurs something under his breath, in the language he has only begun to teach her.

“I should put my shoe back on,” says Lucy, and he lowers her to the ground, bracing her elbow as she balances on one foot. Once shod, she clears her throat, still staring at the ground. “I’m not going to apologize,” she says.

“Thank God.” She looks up in surprise at that, and laughs, and then he is laughing with her. She allows herself to step into his arms; his embrace feels like a homecoming. She sighs, and he holds her closer. 

_Are they sending you anywhere? Will you be safe? Will you be free? Will they let you be free?_ She does not dare ask the questions aloud. He runs a hand through her hair, and she shivers.

“Cold?”

“No.” The word emerges on an unsteady breath. “No, I’m not cold,” she says, as gently as she can. “But we should go.” When she turns back to him with their taxi ordered and her belongings in hand, he is still motionless, regarding her. “What? Flynn — Garcia — ” _how absurd this is,_ she thinks, _and how wonderful_ — “what is it?”

He tries for a smile, and it half-breaks her heart. “Lucy, I don’t…” He silences that thought. When he speaks again, it is almost lightly, and she could scream at him for trying to protect her from his own fear. “I will go with you,” he says, “whither thou goest. Which is something of a misquotation. Where _are_ we going, by the way?”

She looks up at him, half-frowning. “Well, first,” she says slowly, “we’re meeting the others for drinks. Celebrating our new-found freedom.” She’s stalling for time, and she’s sure he knows it, but she’s equally sure that she’s on the edge of figuring out what has shaken him. “I’ve ordered the taxi… oh.” When she sees it, it knocks her breathless. “You don’t have anywhere to go.” She does not even try to phrase it like a question.

“Lucy,” he says, and stops, runs his tongue meditatively over his lower lip. “Lucy,” he says again. This, she decides, is impossible.

“Come home with me?” Her throat tightens around the question. “You don’t have to stay,” she adds quickly. “You don’t have to stay. I mean…” She stops, a little breathless. “Just,” says Lucy, “don’t go off as though you had no alternative, as though you had to.” She swallows. She feels dangerously close to tears. Dangerous, too, how easy it is to imagine his steps in the hall, his humming in the kitchen, the house cleansed of its griefs by the routines of their shared survival. “Don’t assume that you have to be alone,” she says. “Please.” It is that final _please_ that makes his shoulders collapse in relief — or perhaps, she thinks, in simple exhaustion. He holds out his hand, and she takes it.

“Lucy.” For some moments, he says nothing more, his thumb smoothing the heel of her palm. He gazes as if fascinated at her hand, lying within his own. She watches him swallow. “You may,” says Garcia Flynn softly, “find me hard to get rid of.”

“Good. Flynn,” she says, and something fragile — amusement, or tenderness, or pleasure — flickers at the corner of his mouth, “do you realize something?” He looks up at her, open, expectant, and Lucy smiles. “We have all the time in the world.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I suspect that Garcia Flynn has a biblically informed imagination. With years of regular Mass-attendance plus years with limited reading material plus a love of drama, he has to, right?  
> 2) …Would these idiots have gotten their act together and just kissed already before they were safely finished with the daily task of survival? I have my doubts. I also have several disquisitions’ worth of headcanons about Lucy’s doubts/habits/etc. when it comes to romantic initiative or lack thereof.  
> 3) Thanks for reading!


End file.
